Monarch Migration

Every winter millions of Monarch butterflies migrate from the Rocky Mountains in Canada to warmer weather in Michoacan, Mexico. How lucky is Denni, of Chic Muse, to have been able to witness this natural wonder, in person, at the Chincua Mountain Sanctuary? Magical!

Oh – I used to live in Santa Barbara, California and every winter the Monarchs came to an Eucalyptus orchard right at the ocean! So SPECIAL – So amazing to see – and think about it: they do this since thousands of years – again and again….

There was a mini-migration staging in the trees ringing a field next to the house here in southern Ontario in the fall of 2010. It was amazing. I saw all these shapes and colours that looked like dead leaves in trees that had already lost their leaves and when I went to take a closer look they flew off and around the branches. There were several hundred and they hung around for a few days. We have monarch butterflies all over Ontario in the summer, but this was the first gathering of them I’ve ever seen, particularly so late in the season.

This has been on my wish list for a long time! Growing up in Canada we always picked the eggs off the milk weed and raised the caterpillar inside watching it’s many transformations in to the Monarch butterfly!